Indian Startups Today: Perspectives, Challenges, and the Road to Optimization

Start Up India, Stand Up India initiative was launched on August 15, 2015, by the Government of India. The primary focus was to strengthen the start-ups through encouraging funding flexibility by banks. The incentives provisioned were aimed to promote entrepreneurship and to provide employment to our youth. This kind of schemes provide support mechanism for commercialization and development of innovative products, services, and mechanisms, which are fuelled by intellectual property as well as any new indigenous technology. The Indian startup ecosystem has witnessed substantial growth over the past two decades, with a strong support from our wide corporate framework. These startups have played and will continue to play crucial role in socio-economic development and transformation of our economic setup. This paper attempts to examine the challenges and opportunities faced by Indian startups, supporting policies and initiatives of our government and impact of these startups on the Indian economy. It highlights the evolutionary pathway of the startup ecosystems, the existing support mechanisms and projections for future. The ever changing, adaptive and transformative nature of startups in our country and their role in India's economic landscape is also presented. It is quite important to mention the business supportive initiatives like "Make in India" and "Start-up India," that have generated hopes for significant growth of Indian economy in the days to come. The impact of "Make in India" campaign has already been observed on the Indian startup ecosystem, because of its focus on identifying and rewarding the potential for innovation and job creation. However, like other fields, a few challenges are lurking ahead, which range from finance, skill shortage, and sustainability. Though putting a lot of pressure on our resources, India's vast population also presents opportunities for businesses to fulfill diverse needs, starting from considerable necessities to innovative solutions. The start-ups may boost the economy in many ways, like making the products and services more affordable to a massive market of India. Some of the attractive start-ups may even be successful in widening their reach to the global market. This paper discusses the brighter sides of the start-ups in India, along with highlighting the challenges, also emphasizing the collaborative approach of the government and entrepreneurs for success of start-ups and to sustain a productive business environment.